Commercial Skipping - broken?

Live TV & DVR
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1

Server Version#: 1.20.1.3252
Player Version#: 1.19.0.1399-31d8c803
Tuner Make/Model: HDHomerun Quadro
Guide/Lineup name: UK Freeview National
Using XMLTV?: No
Channel number/Name: Any

So I have been attempting to get the DVR Recording to mark commercials for skip
I recorded a number of TV shows across a variety of channels, and while I can see that Plex Commercial Skipper is running - and generating a log file, it doesnt appear to end up with any commercials for skipping.

I did run the command manually - and it generated an .edl file - along with a variety of log and text files. I can see that it works. (ALthough that was under root, logged into the container command line).

In the logs, I can see it starts the process - but there appears to be no indication it has produced any output. The log file that was detected in the logs is gone, and there is no .edl file.

I also dont seem to be getting intro detection on libraries, amongst other things.

I’m running on OMV 5, Debian 10, Kernel v 5.7 from backports . Transcoding works, as it does under hardware too - but comskipper seems to not produce any usable output.

Furthermore, I turned on the ‘Transcode file after recording’ function, but it seems to have had no effect.

Any help?

2

You can see if commercial markers were successfully generated by examining the XML information for an item:

See the “XML Information/XML File” section.

If markers are generated, they’ll be listed toward the bottom of the file (as will intro markers).

image

3

Aha - yes, they are present!

<MediaContainer size="1" allowSync="1" identifier="com.plexapp.plugins.library" librarySectionID="3" librarySectionTitle="TV programmes" librarySectionUUID="c6463c37-bf6f-4740-8f1e-a54a40b908b0" mediaTagPrefix="/system/bundle/media/flags/" mediaTagVersion="1598519402">
<Video ratingKey="3570" key="/library/metadata/3570" skipParent="1" grandparentRatingKey="3568" guid="plex://episode/5f578db8ad76e1003fd5b013" parentGuid="plex://season/5d15a6bee4b7c4001e86ed7c/2020" grandparentGuid="plex://show/5d15a6bee4b7c4001e86ed7c" type="episode" title="Building the Dream" grandparentKey="/library/metadata/3568" librarySectionTitle="TV programmes" librarySectionID="3" librarySectionKey="/library/sections/3" grandparentTitle="Building the Dream" parentTitle="Season 2020" summary="An architectural designer helps people build their dream homes." parentIndex="2020" viewOffset="248000" lastViewedAt="1600290162" year="2020" thumb="/library/metadata/3570/thumb/1600203782" grandparentThumb="/library/metadata/3568/thumb/1600203782" duration="3956800" originallyAvailableAt="2020-09-08" addedAt="1600203780" updatedAt="1600203782" oneShot="1">
<Media id="3087" duration="3956800" bitrate="3572" width="1024" height="576" aspectRatio="1.78" audioChannels="2" audioCodec="mp2" videoCodec="h264" videoResolution="576" container="mpegts" videoFrameRate="PAL" channelIdentifier="042" mediaGrabBeginsAt="1600200000" mediaGrabDevice="device://tv.plex.grabbers.hdhomerun/125226F0" mediaGrabStatus="complete" origin="dvr" videoProfile="main">
<Part accessible="1" exists="1" id="3089" key="/library/parts/3089/1600203779/file.ts" duration="3956800" file="/media/TV/Building the Dream (2013)/Season 2020/Building the Dream (2013) - 2020-09-08 13 57 12 - Building the Dream.ts" size="1766882468" container="mpegts" deepAnalysisVersion="4" packetLength="188" requiredBandwidths="9618,7629,4229,4141,4141,4141,4141,4141" videoProfile="main">
<Stream id="4949" streamType="1" codec="h264" index="0" bitrate="3444" bitDepth="8" chromaLocation="left" chromaSubsampling="4:2:0" codedHeight="576" codedWidth="1024" frameRate="25.000" hasScalingMatrix="0" height="576" level="31" profile="main" refFrames="4" requiredBandwidths="9489,7501,4139,4139,4139,4139,4139,4139" scanType="progressive" streamIdentifier="256" width="1024" displayTitle="480p (H.264)" extendedDisplayTitle="480p (H.264)"/>
<Stream id="4950" streamType="2" selected="1" codec="mp2" index="1" channels="2" bitrate="128" language="English" languageCode="eng" audioChannelLayout="stereo" requiredBandwidths="129,129,129,129,129,129,129,129" samplingRate="48000" streamIdentifier="257" displayTitle="English (MP2 Stereo)" extendedDisplayTitle="English (MP2 Stereo)"/>
<Stream id="4951" streamType="3" codec="dvb_subtitle" index="2" language="English" languageCode="eng" requiredBandwidths="14,14,14,14,14,14,14,14" streamIdentifier="258" displayTitle="English (DVB_SUBTITLE)" extendedDisplayTitle="English (DVB_SUBTITLE)"/>
</Part>
</Media>
<Genre id="4908" filter="genre=4908" tag="Lifestyle"/>
<Genre id="4909" filter="genre=4909" tag="Home & Garden"/>
<Genre id="4910" filter="genre=4910" tag="Home Projects"/>
<Genre id="4911" filter="genre=4911" tag="How-To"/>
<Channel id="4767" filter="channel=4767" tag="042 HGTV"/>
<Marker type="commercial" startTimeOffset="896800" endTimeOffset="936920"/>
<Marker type="commercial" startTimeOffset="1094440" endTimeOffset="1179760"/>
<Marker type="commercial" startTimeOffset="3067640" endTimeOffset="3192800"/>
<Extras size="0"> </Extras>
<Related> </Related>
</Video>
</MediaContainer>

What I am not seeing, however, is the option to skip…

I’ve tried on iOS, fireTV , Windows desktop app, web player - none seem to offer a skip option for commercials

4

Do you have multiple episodes of the same season of the show? The way intro detection is performed requires multiple episodes to compare to one another to find a section of audio which is common to them near the beginning and of at least a certain length I believe. I don’t remember the specifics. But if there is only a single episode or the intro is relatively short, it won’t be marked.

5

EDIT:
I have now discovered it pops up just before the marker - which on the example above is not exactly accurate - but the skip is there.

THanks for your advice - I now know it works! Just not very well at the moment!

I need to tweak comskip.ini

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